Vista main culprit in Microsoft layoffs — Windows Vista has been trouble for Microsoft perhaps since the operating system's beginning. And this last quarter was certainly no exception. Despite a dip in client software revenue, however, one analyst says the workforce reduction Microsoft detailed …

Brief update on Digg — Wanted to reach out to folks with an update on Digg and our priorities for 2009 as well as address some of the recent speculation about our business. — As we've often stated over the past couple of months, given the current economic climate, we've made the decision …

Announcing Google's Employee Option Exchange Program — Today we announced our plans to do something more for the people who are responsible for Google's success — our employees. Recognizing that about 85% of our employees have at least some stock options that are underwater (i.e. …

Q&A: Microsoft defends return to DRM — Microsoft yesterday unveiled its MSN Mobile Music service - and a surprise return to digital rights management (DRM). — While companies such as Apple and Amazon have finally moved to music download services free of copy protection …

Android Cupcake Update: The Official Word — According to an announcement by T-Mobile's Product Development and Public Relations departments, a message approved by Google sent via email to Will (T-Mobile Forums Administrator), the Cupcake update will not be released to the general public …

Welcome You Fine Google Notebook Users — Recently, Google announced that they were stopping development on Google Notebook. We're big fans of Google Notebook, in fact many of used it before Evernote came along. When we heard the news, we immediately began work on a Google Notebook import tool.

Stanford Students Release A Cool Batch Of iPhone Apps — Students from Stanford's Fall 1008 iPhone class CS193P created a nice crop of apps that are now available or will be soon for the iPhone (see our Stanford Facebook apps posts here and here). — A list of them is here, and some of them I'm going to keep on my phone.

Watch out Wikipedia, here comes Britannica 2.0 — Encyclopedia Britannica president Jorge Cauz. Inset: Wikipedia's cofounder Jimmy Wales. — In a move to take on Wikipedia, the Encyclopedia Britannica is inviting the hoi polloi to edit, enhance and contribute to its online version.

Securities watchdog pursues record fine for RIM execs — Regulator seeks up to $100-million in stock option controversy — The Ontario Securities Commission is seeking a record penalty — one that could be as high as $100-million — from the top two executives of Research In Motion Ltd …

Samsung records Q4 loss, annual profit slumps — South Korea's Samsung Electronics recorded a net loss for the last three months of 2008, while its net profit for the entire year fell 26 percent, it said Friday. — The company's net loss for the last three months of 2008 was 22 billion won …

Brad Garlinghouse's Next Act — When we last heard from Brad Garlinghouse, he was stepping down as Yahoo's senior VP in charge of such massive properties as Mail, Messenger, Groups and Flickr. That was around six months ago - 20 months after his infamous memo - and it seems that he's finally working on a new project.

Fact: There is no HP Mini 1100 series — I've been exchanging e-mails with HP for the better part of the day and we have the final word on the supposed Mini 1100 series with an ExpressCard slot. It doesn't exist and it was mistake made by the Web team. This is straight from horse's mouth, people.

Advanced Micro Devices Q4 Even Worse Than Expected — Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) this afternoon posted even worse fourth quarter results that the Street had expected. — For the quarter, the company posted revenue of $1.162 billion, below the Street consensus of $1.23 billion, down 35% sequentially and off 33% from a year earlier.

Playing around with Google's AJAX APIs — For me, documentation isn't always enough to learn about APIs; I need examples that I can play with. That's why I started a fun project recently—a tool for teaching developers how to use Google's JavaScript APIs: the AJAX API Playground.

Communicating with code — Some people can sell their ideas with a brilliant speech or a slick powerpoint presentation. — I can't. — Maybe that's why I'm skeptical of ideas that are sold via brilliant speeches and slick powerpoints. Or maybe it's because it's too easy to overlook the messy details …

Better Than Owning — Ownership is not as important as it once was. — I use roads that I don't own. I have immediate access to 99% of the roads and highways of the world (with a few exceptions) because they are a public commons. We are all granted this street access via our payment of local taxes.

Sony has lost what made it special — In the glory days of the 1970s and 1980s, Sony's Inazawa factory made cathode ray tubes and sent them down the road to Ichinomiya, where they were used in Trinitron televisions and exported. — After Sony announced an unexpectedly large operating loss …

Boxee now lets you get “Lost” in ABC content — The new season of ABC's hit show Lost premiered last night. Some people (me, for example) were busy and missed it. I was all set to buy the season pass on iTunes — but it's $50 (in HD). I'd rather watch it for free, streaming at ABC.com, but that leaves me chained to my desk.